In Italy six and a half years of rule by centre-left governments came to an end in 2001 when elections swept into power a centre-right coalition led by media magnate Silvio Berlusconi, the richest man in the country. (SeeBiographies.) Shortly afterward, violence broke out in the northern port city of Genoa during antiglobalization protests staged while a Group of Eight (G-8) summit was being held in the city. What ultimately overshadowed these events, however, was a deep anxiety in Italy over possible repercussions from the U.S.-led war on terrorism.

The elections in May, with 630 seats at stake in the Chamber of Deputies and 315 in the Senate, were essentially a fight between two alliances—Berlusconi’s House of Freedoms and the centre-left Olive Tree partnership led by Francesco Rutelli, a former mayor of Rome.The campaign centred on a highly personalized duel between the leaders of the two alliances, with Berlusconi branding his opponents “communists” and Rutelli applauding the British magazine The Economist for describing Berlusconi as “unfit to rule” in part because he had recently come under investigation for money laundering, tax evasion, and bribery, among other charges. Whereas Rutelli struggled to pull together partners split by chronic bickering, however, Berlusconi’s alliance, led by his own Forza Italia party—the country’s biggest—maintained unity. Commentators noted that superior financial resources also greatly helped Berlusconi’s cause; for instance, he was able to send a biographical photo album of himself to every household in the country. In a television spot aired shortly before the elections, Berlusconi brandished a huge parchmentlike scroll bearing pledges that bound him—over five years—to lower taxes, create more than a million new jobs, embark on a major public-works program, and increase the minimum monthly pension to 1 million lire (about $465). He called this his “contract” with Italians.

The outcome was a triumph for Berlusconi, who had already enjoyed seven months of premiership in 1994. The House of Freedoms scooped up 368 seats in the Chamber against the Olive Tree’s 242, while in the smaller Senate the figures were 177 to 125, respectively. Forza Italia increased its share of the House’s cake by 9%, while another alliance member, Umberto Bossi’s Northern League—which championed more autonomy for the north of Italy—fared worse than predicted. It took Berlusconi a month to put together a 23-member cabinet, in which Bossi, after much haggling, became minister for devolution, while the foreign minister’s post went to a nonpolitician, Renato Ruggiero. The new prime minister’s team won a vote of confidence in June by 351–261. Before the vote Berlusconi had promised an unspecified solution to a much-aired issue, that of the “conflict of interest” he faced as a political leader involved in big business.

Trouble came in July when Genoa was for three days ravaged and turned into a virtual theatre of war during pitched battles between 19,000 police and tens of thousands of antiglobalization demonstrators besieging a summit of the G-8. One protester, 23-year-old Carlo Giuliani, was killed when a police officer whom he had threatened with a fire extinguisher shot him. “I was afraid of being lynched,” the officer later explained. The reported number of persons injured in the mayhem amounted to more than 200, and about 280 arrests were made. Police met assaults, stone throwing, and molotov cocktails with baton charges and tear gas, but both protest organizers and the government ascribed most of the violence to black-clad intruders, including many non-Italians, who belonged to a group known as the Black Bloc; this was the same group that had first attracted headlines by rioting at a World Trade Organization summit in Seattle, Wash., in 1999. Accused of muscling in on a protest meant to be peaceful, the Black Bloc members were generally identified as the ones who set cars and rubbish bins ablaze in Genoa, vandalized banks, shops, and supermarkets, and attacked the local jail.

Another incident during the Genoa protests contributed to nationwide dismay. Police conducted a midnight raid on a school housing scores of protesters, after which the Italian media showed pools and splashes of blood on the floors and walls of the school. Later the opposition noisily accused police of “brutal violence,” but Interior Minister Claudio Scajola ignored cries for his resignation, claiming that the raid was justified because the school had harboured troublemakers. A parliamentary commission, under a Forza Italia chairman, eventually declared the summit “a success,” ascribed police “excesses” to individuals, and charged that “peaceful protesters” were guilty of tolerating violent elements in their midst.

Fearing a repetition of violence at other planned international meetings in Italy, the government proposed changing the locations of a September NATO conference in Naples—which, as a result, was held in Brussels instead—and a November UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) conference in Rome. After contemplating a switch to the Adriatic resort of Rimini, the FAO opted not to relocate its conference from Rome after all.

Uproar then broke out in Parliament when, in August and October, it passed legislation explained by the government as a step toward sweeping away obsolescence and helping business but denounced by an angry opposition as meant to serve the interests of the prime minister or his friends. One new law replaced a prison term for rendering false tax returns with a pecuniary penalty. A left-wing leader, Pierluigi Castagnetti, told Parliament that no country in the world would “pass a measure to solve its leader’s problems with the law.” At the time he spoke, Berlusconi faced penal proceedings for alleged financial misdeeds. Another new law, which dealt with rules of evidence, decreed as inadmissible documentation acquired from abroad if the procedure followed to obtain it differed from Italy’s. The government refuted the charges against it, terming its opponents “guardians of lies.”

The prime minister stuck to his pledge on pensions but urged followers to vote “no” in an October referendum on devolution called by the previous government. Nevertheless, Italians, by a margin of 64–34%, voted “yes” to the referendum and thus approved proposed changes in the working of the Italian state. The central government would relinquish powers to the country’s regions in, for example, the spheres of education and the environment. City councils would also be able to raise certain taxes.

Following the September 11 terrorist attacks in the U.S., Berlusconi was among the European leaders who lined up to pledge support for the U.S.-led war on terrorism. The prime minister put the country on heightened alert and promised that Italy was “by the side of the United States and all who are committed to the battle against terrorism.” Italy offered troops as well as the use of its ports and airports, but many in the country were anxious over possible repercussions from the conflict. Berlusconi hardly helped allay these anxieties with his statement to reporters in late September that the West was “superior” to Islamic civilization because it provided wealth and guaranteed respect for human rights. While the prime minister maintained that his comments had been taken out of context, European Union leaders took pains to distance themselves from his remarks.

Disaster struck Italy in October at Milan’s Linate airport when, in heavy fog, a Scandinavian airliner collided during takeoff with a small jet taxiing across its path, killing a total of 118 people. (SeeDisasters.) Terrorism was initially suspected, but aviation experts later ruled it out, putting part of the blame instead on the absence of a working ground-level radar at the airport.